Tracy Keogh, chief human resources officer at HP, joined her peers at Fortune’s recent Most Powerful Women event series and shared that she had “never seen so much best practices sharing.”
“With all the negativity and the downsides [of the current crises], that’s been a real bright spot for me,” Keogh said.
The coronavirus pandemic that forced many companies to shut down their operations and require their employees to work from home was quickly followed by a racial justice movement that made employers seriously examine how they are fostering greater equity in the workplace. “The new way of working creates opportunities in the area of inclusion and belonging, with remote work allowing companies to hire from anywhere,” says Tracy Layney, CHRO at Levi Strauss & Co. “I think there is so much opportunity embedded in this moment that if we just harness it, it can actually help us address multiple crises that we are facing right now.”
The HR leaders offered five tips on how best to deal with the crisis including:
- Stepping up efforts to fight burnout
- Adopting a very strong communications plan
- Tackling racial inequality with concrete actions
- Embracing flexible solutions
- Taking a critical view of evaluations
“For performance management, we decided to combine it with our goals and ask employees to tell us what three to five things they are most proud of, and what they need more or less of from their manager,” says Jill Larsen, CHRO, at technology firm PTC. “We then had the managers respond to that and indicate what they need more or less from the employees. The hope is to start more of a dialogue and embrace empathy.”